Kisses in the Rain (15 page)

"Of course it's important," he said seriously. "Everything about you is important to me." It went without saying; didn't she know that?

"I made up my mind a long time ago that I was going to succeed in some facet of business," she said with a steely glint in her eye that he'd never noticed before. "It has a lot to do with my father and the way I was brought up."

She looked so stiff and uncomfortable, so patently unlike herself, that he knew this was a sensitive subject. He decided to make it easier for her.

"Your father wanted a son but had three daughters," Nick guessed. "He wanted a son to take over the business."

Martha blinked. "How did you know?" she said.

"I must have seen a movie like that once. Let me tell you the rest of the plot. You were the one he was counting on to take over the business. And you knew he was counting on you. Am I right so far?"

Her eyes, which had looked so somber, showed a hint of sparkle. "So far, yes."

"And so you worked very hard in school and in college and—"

"And?"

"And why don't you finish the story? There must be some reason why you didn't take over the business as scheduled."

Martha bit her lip. "Yes, there was," she said quietly. "Dad died, and then there wasn't any business anymore." She shrugged lightly as if to deny the pain.

"I'm sorry, Martha," he said with an expression of deep concern. "I didn't mean to make light of it."

Martha inhaled a deep breath. "It's all right. I've pulled through it. But when Dad died at the beginning of my junior year in college, I thought it was the end of the world. I'd just declared a business major, and I'd spent the summer working with Dad at the retail clothing store he owned in Greenleaf. It was a pretty good-sized operation; he sold both men's and women's clothes."

"You must have liked the work," Nick said.

"Oh, I loved it from the beginning, even from the time when Dad would take me to the store with him on Saturday mornings and feed me peppermints from his bottom desk drawer. When I was older, Dad was thrilled that I took an interest in the store because my sisters Roxie and Rebecca never had, except to work there during the summers while they were in high school. Dad and I both looked forward to the day when I'd be able to take over some of the responsibility from him so he could get some well-deserved rest. But after Dad died and we found out how deeply in debt he was, there was nothing to do but sell the store."

"Wasn't there anything else you could do?"

Martha shook her head. "It's very risky, running a business of your own. You have to tie up a lot of money in inventory. There's no one to fall back on if you have a couple of bad years. I saw it happen with Dad, and that's why I wouldn't start my own business. That's why I was happy when Sidney made it possible for me to be part of his. I won't turn my back on this opportunity. I can't."

"Is it the money, Martha?"

"Not the money, especially, although that's nice. It's the feeling of accomplishment. It's knowing that I'll be responsible for making important decisions. For building a business practically from the ground up."

"You could do that anywhere," Nick pointed out.

"There are very few companies where I'll have the chance I have with Sidney Pollov Enterprises," Martha said. "No risk for me, and every opportunity. I can't go wrong."

"You can't go, period. I don't want you to leave at the end of the summer, Martha. I'd miss you terribly."

"Nick, I can't continue selling bagels on the dock in the winter. Unless it were frozen bagels, and I don't think that's what Sidney has in mind."

She wasn't going to give an inch, at least not during this go-round. Nick sighed and pulled her into his arms.

She forgot everything when he took her in his arms and began to rain little kisses on her ear, on the softly curving line of her jaw. His delicately teasing kisses made her hungry for more, and she pulled his lips down to hers. All the loneliness of the past five days faded away, and Martha felt herself opening to him, unfolding in the heat of his pleasure. His shoulder muscles hardened beneath her gentle fingertips, and she tasted and explored him with unrestrained joy and wonder.

"My dear Cheechako," he murmured against her lips, and his hands moved up her back, then drifted along her rib cage until they encircled her breasts. His touch was gentle yet sure, awakening nerves and hypnotizing her with pleasure.

They slid downward on the couch, and the emotion in Martha's sea-gray eyes drowned him in its sheer intensity. She loved him; he could see that. And he loved her. It was time for their relationship to progress to the next step, the merging of their bodies and minds in the most beautiful form of communication ever known.

Despite her acquiescence up to this point, Martha apparently had other ideas.

"Nick," she said. "Stop."

At the sound of her words, Martha struggled her way out of a lovely romantic daze, and at first she wasn't sure Nick even heard her.

But then he pulled back.

"Something's wrong?"

"I'm not comfortable with what was happening between us. Oh, I know, I know. We love each other, and we're both getting tired of only hugs and kisses. But I'm going away at the end of the summer, and maybe we don't want to get that involved." Her hands fluttered, a sign of nervousness. Nick captured them with his and kissed her lightly on the lips.

"I want to get involved in every way possible" he assured her. "I'm madly in love with you, and we've both waited long enough."

"It's different for a man," Martha said.

"I don't think so. We've taken it slowly so far, but I want to be with the woman I love."

He was the dearest man; he was masculine, considerate, thoughtful and kind. He was emotionally self-sufficient. He was wonderful with children. Martha had seen that in the way he took care of Davey.

But how could she tie herself to a man she would leave in a few short months? She'd never been one for casual sex. She'd always demanded a relationship before she took things to the next level.

"Nick, I want to be with you too," she said, meaning it.
 

"But?" His eyes searched hers.

She struggled to find an answer. Lindsay would have said it was better to have loved Nick completely than only to have loved him halfway. Lindsay, of course, would have been referring to the physical side of their relationship. Martha knew herself well enough to understand that if she loved Nick that way she might never be able to leave him. And there were so many things she didn't know about Nick. One of them was sleeping in her bed only a few feet away.

"I guess I'm just not ready," she said lamely.

"Not ready. While I'm more than ready."

"Um, yes. Nick, I missed you so much. I couldn't wait to see you. I'm sure I love you as much as you love me. But give me a little more time, okay?" Her eyes pleaded with him.

He seemed to think about this for a moment. "Well, Martha," he said finally, touching his lips to her fingertips with something that looked like laughter in his eyes, "just remember this. I'm ready whenever you are."

At that he really did laugh, a loud, booming sound that woke Davey, but before Davey could come into the living room he kissed Martha with a thoroughness that completely proved his point.

During the next few days, Martha delighted in her reunion with Nick. Their five-day separation made every moment even more precious to her, especially because she knew she would not stay past Labor Day.

Nick met her at the Bagel Barn every day and together they ate lunch, sometimes in Nick's company car if the weather was bad, sometimes in the café where they always ordered steaming-hot bowls of chili in honor of that first Sunday they had spent together, sometimes overlooking the Narrows with the boats sailing in and out past the big cruise ships.

And they laughed. They laughed at everything. They laughed at people and the tourists and themselves. They laughed at silly jokes. Most importantly, they laughed at the same things. Over and over Martha was taken with their compatibility.

Occasionally Martha felt that this part of her life was taking place in a happy dream. They were both so absorbed in one another that they each developed an urgent, insatiable need for the other's presence. No matter how cloudy the day, no matter how cold the drizzle, they created their own sunshine and warmth when they were together.

Those were emotional days, but there were no more emotional nights. Martha knew that Nick was purposely giving her the space she needed. She was grateful to him for that even when every fiber of her being longed to be with him through the long, cool nights, warmth against warmth.

But although he kissed her and told her he loved her each day, he did nothing to pressure her into a physical relationship. And that told her he really loved her more than anything else.

She
thought
he loved her, anyway. Until one morning when she called his office to find out if their previously agreed-upon time for lunch still stood and was told by his personal assistant that Mr. Novak was out of town.

"Out of town? Are you sure?" He hadn't called her. He hadn't texted. But she'd had no reason to expect him to disappear.

"He left early this morning," was the short reply.

"When will he be back?" Martha asked.

"He'll be gone indefinitely. We don't know when Mr. Novak will return."

"Did he leave a message for me?"

"No. No message."

The click on the other end of the line preceded the loud buzz of the dial tone.

"Indefinitely?" Martha whispered unbelievingly as she stared at the dial pad of her cell phone.

She simply couldn't believe that Nick would leave Ketchikan without a word to her.

Chapter 8

What had happened?

Martha asked herself this anguished question over and over each day that Nick didn't come home. Had she said something to drive him away? She went over every word they'd said since he'd returned from Juneau. They had been so happy together. Why would he leave suddenly without telling her?

She thought of asking Hallie, but Hallie was at Williwaw Lodge, and there was no way to contact her except by shortwave radio. Martha didn't have access to shortwave, although she knew there was one at the office of Novak and Sons. After being so summarily turned away by Nick's assistant, however, she wouldn't ask to use it.

Faye was away in the bush ministering to the sick, and so Martha had no one to talk to. Randy was kind and sympathetic, but Martha hadn't enlightened him about the reason for her distraction. She thought Randy was very clever, therefore, when he asked her abruptly one day, "What's the matter? Has Nick gone away again?"

She nodded quietly and busied herself with counting the money they'd taken in that day. She had to keep a tight hold on the bills; for a week, a brisk wind had swept in off the Narrows, and it showed no sign of letting up.

Randy waited until she was finished counting the money before he said, "Nick's always traveling someplace or another. I'd get used to it if I were you."

This surprised her. "I thought Nick preferred to stay home," she said. "Because of Davey, you know."

"That may be true, but Nick's his own person. He takes off from time to time, and he never tells anyone where he's going. He doesn't take Davey, either. The only time he's ever taken Davey with him is when they went to Juneau."

"I didn't know you knew Nick that well."

Randy shrugged, "I don't. My mother is Hallie's sister Wanda's closest friend. So I hear a lot of things about Nick."

Sometimes Martha forgot what a small town Ketchikan really was. Randy's disclosure didn't help her. It only worried her more. She couldn't understand why Nick would tell her he didn't like to work on the family fishing fleet because he wanted to stay home with Davey and then take off for days at a time for some unknown destination.

Could it have something to do with her refusal to make love the night he came back from Juneau? Martha turned that thought over in her mind and weighed it carefully. Maybe he knew someone else, another woman, one who didn't live in Ketchikan. And yet, if he did, she felt as though she'd know. She didn't think that Nick could have been so open and trusting and loving with her if he had another woman stashed away in the wilderness somewhere. He didn't strike her as a two-timer.